No Such Thing
by tsutsuji
Summary: Crossover with The Faculty. Casey Connor escapes painful life at Herrington High School and finds himself in Tol Eressea, where Frodo is not yet healed from the wounds inflicted by Shadow. Philosophical discussions, hc, and possibly romance follow. (Casey
1. part one

Title: No Such Thing 1?

Author: Tsutsuji

Fandom: Lord of the Rings/The Faculty crossover

Pairing: Casey Connor & Frodo. (yes, will probably be slash!)

Rating: R (rating for part one: PG)

Warnings: Slash, crossover, interspecies, angst, h/c.

Date written: 8/02 revisited 4/05

Status: WIP

Disclaimer: I do not own the copyright to these characters and I'm making no profit from this fic and intend no copyright infringement.

Summary: How did Casey Connor go from being class wimp one day to world-saving hero the next? At the beginning of what's going to be a Very Bad Day, Casey finds himself transported to another world where he discovers that sometimes books and movies are more than just stories.

(AN: This will only make any sense if you've seen The Faculty and read Lord of the Rings. I'm putting my own spin on what life would be like for Frodo and Bilbo after they sailed West with the Elves; it probably doesn't jive with canon, but this is fanfic, not canon.

I started writing this back when there was a lot of hobbit-slash-fic coming out, and the FrodoSlash email list specialized in interspecies stories. I'm revisiting it now because I needed a break from Yu-gi-oh so I'm posting what I've got so far. )

...  
I want to run through the halls of my high school  
I want to scream at the top of my lungs  
I just found out there's no such thing as the real world  
Just a lie you have to rise above.  
John Mayer  
...

It was a trick of survival that Casey Connor had learned a long time ago: when the pain gets to be too much, think of something else. It was automatic now, at least when he saw it coming. When they grabbed him and started running down the hill full tilt, even while he was yelling and struggling, his mind would just slip off into some mathematical problem, or else call up a scene from a favorite book or the movie he'd watched the night before when he couldn't sleep. By the time he made contact with the flagpole, he hardly felt it. That would come later, when they left him alone; then the mental barrier would shatter and the pain would take over, along with its constant companion, humiliation. But then he could deal with it, when they weren't all watching and laughing.

It worked this morning like any other. Before he was halfway across the high school yard, they found him, the usual crowd of kids who were all bigger and stronger than him and just needed to make that point ever now and then. Soon there was that familiar sensation of being carried and lurching along toward inevitable agony. With his eyes closed and his mind locked into something else, Casey only registered the sudden jarring stop, and then felt himself falling, dropped where he was. Ripples of triumphant laughter faded away behind the soft roaring in his head that muffled all other sensations.

Oddly enough, after that dislocating jolt, the rocking sensation of being carried along to destruction seemed to continue. And the pain had already caught up with him. Instead of being out there somewhere where he could sense it but not feel it, agony tore through him from the base of his spine to his toes and out, it seemed, through the top of his head.

"Something's wrong," Casey thought groggily. "It didn't work this time." It was as if the pain had just shifted to another level, sharp and dull at the same time. It was there in every part of him, as if every bang and bump and bruise and humiliation he'd ever received had been stored up somewhere, and now had been poured back into him all at once. His eyes were clenched shut against it, but it seemed the light beyond his lids had gone dim. Sound was muffled, too, as if his other senses had fled, leaving only the sensation of agony. But under that there was the rocking motion, and, he realized slowly, something solid against his back, and an unfamiliar smell that didn't seem to fit with anything.

Casey opened his eyes, whimpering a little, expecting even that small movement to hurt. Above him was blank grayness, not solid but depthless like fog. He realized he was lying on his back on some hard surface, arms and legs splayed out. The hard surface rolled gently beneath him. He felt limp and drained and shaken, but he didn't think he could move.

"Just wait," he told himself. That's the only other thing to do with pain, he knew: wait and it would pass, or at least descend to a manageable level. But it didn't. It stayed right there with him.

The swaying, rocking motion, side-to-side and head to foot, started to make him feel sick. His stomach rolled in protest, and he knew he had to sit up or at least roll over. If he started to spew while lying on his back he'd probably choke and die.

That would get rid of the pain once and for all, a part of his mind suggested. But he didn't listen to it. He never did, even though he'd heard that same suggestion many times before. If he listened to that part of his mind, he'd have been gone long ago.

He managed to roll to the side, wincing, even though he found that movement didn't make it hurt any worse. He met something solid, a short wall of wood, and pulled himself up against it. Then he looked over it, and gasped. On the other side of the grey planks of wood there was nothing but water. As far as he could see, an ocean of water, rolling and green, and above it, endless gray fog. What he thought was a wall was really the side of a small, grey boat.

He looked around, squinting in disbelief. He had been lying with his head in the prow of the small wooden craft, which wasn't much larger than a single-person rowboat. Between his feet was the broken stump of a mast. There was nothing else, no ropes or oars, no seats or cushions, no motor or any sign that there ever was one.

"I'm not really here," he said, bemused and momentarily distracted from his discomfort. It occurred to him that maybe he'd really gone crazy this time, and that was a relief of sorts. It also occurred to him briefly that he might be dead, but that didn't make any sense at all, because he didn't think he'd hurt all over as he did, or feel so incredibly sick, or be in a boat with a broken mast.

"And I thought high school was hell," Casey thought wryly as his stomach spasmed. He leaned over the side of the boat, and it rocked and swayed with the shift of his weight, tipping him toward the water. That did him in. Breakfast returned with a vengeance, dumped from his heaving body into the endless ocean and quickly washed away. When he was empty, his stomach continued to heave, as if it was trying to get rid of even the memory of everything he'd ever eaten in his life. Finally the spasms stopped, leaving him gasping for breath.

He hung there, draped over the side of the boat with his face inches from the water. Taking deep gulps of air, he suddenly recognized the strange odor he noticed earlier-- the smell of the sea. He'd never known it before, only the suggestion of it in a seafood restaurant or at the edge of a lake, but he knew at once that's what it is, as if he'd known it all along. The sea.

The analytical part of his mind started wondering why he should have dreamed himself here, drifting in a boat on an ocean with no sight of land. It seemed a strange place for his mind to bring him to escape the pain. But then, he usually knew enough not to bring the pain with him. That was the point, after all.

It didn't make sense. Nothing did.

He looked down at the water, into its murky shades of green, distracted for a moment by watching little waves break against the side of the boat. He couldn't lift his head. He felt thirsty, suddenly, but the water did not look or smell at all inviting to drink. Eventually he called up the strength to lift a hand and dip it into the water. He felt dull shock at the cool wetness of it, as if it were real water, which it couldn't be. He splashed some onto his face, nevertheless, and found it surprisingly refreshing. He could lift his head again. The sense of feeling sick faded considerably, although he still didn't feel like he could get up and dance on a table. His head hurt less too, although the rest of him still ached and throbbed.

A couple more splashes on his face and neck made him feel soothed enough that he could roll backward. For a while he lay there, flat on his back, staring up at the blank grey depth above him. The cool water left him chilled, though, and he pulled his knees up to his chin, curling onto his side, groaning with the effort. He huddled, shivering, drained and limp, and tried to think of a part of him that didn't hurt. Then he tried to think of something else, but he couldn't seem to remember any fact he'd ever learned. He couldn't recall a math problem or a science text, and his mind spun, muddled and swirling and dull like the sea and the sky.

Nothing made sense. Why a boat? Why the ocean?

He realized he'd faded away into something like sleep, as he came back to awareness suddenly. The muffled gurgle of the water had changed; it had sharpened and gained direction. There was a low rumbling and a rhythmic rushing sound, and it came closer swiftly. The boat rocked more sharply, dipping and rising.

Raising his head a bit, Casey sensed more than saw a solid shadow in the fog. The incessant rocking was too much, though, and dizziness overtook him. He dropped his head onto his arm and closed his eyes.

Sometime later he open them, sensing another change. The boat was no longer rocking, but something else was moving beside and above him. He heard the crunching sound of footsteps on gravel, the wash and tumble of waves, and soft voices saying strange words nearby.

He lifted his eyes with an effort, focusing blearily on the two figures who stood over the boat looking down at him. They had long, shiny hair framing solemn faces, and they seemed to be wearing some kind of robes that were the color of mist lit up by the sun. They looked as puzzled, as astonished, as he would have been if he had the strength. The two exchanged a glance and then looked down at him again, and one of them spoke. It seemed to be a question, but Casey had no idea what it meant.

"Look, I know you're not real or anything," he said weakly to them, "but could you help me?"

Their eyes widened at his words, but they continued to stare blankly at him.

"Not a clue," Casey muttered, and dropped his head hopelessly.

One of them reached out with a tentative hand, and touched Casey's damp face. At the touch of cool fingers there was a blessed moment when all the pain was gone and everything felt right again. And then, even better, there was nothing at all.

(continued in part two)


	2. part two

Title: No Such Thing 2?

Author: Tsutsuji

Fandom: Lord of the Rings/The Faculty crossover

Pairing: Casey Connor & Frodo. (Yes, will probably be slash. Maybe.)

Rating: R (rating for part two: PG)

Warnings: Slash, crossover, interspecies, angst, h/c.

Date written: 9/02 revisited 4/05

Status: WIP

Disclaimer: I do not own the copyright to these characters and I'm making no profit from this fic and intend no copyright infringement.

Bilbo paused on his walk along the rocky path overlooking the sea. Behind him, down the long grassy slope, he could see a whiff of smoke that marked where his home was hidden in the roll of the hills. Below him to the right, the unusually quiet waves broke against the rocks that hid the beach to the south. Beyond it, on the edge of sight, a bank of cloud hung far at the southern horizon, blurring the boundary between sea and sky. Nearly straight in front of him, across a glittering bay, the city of Avalonne's gleaming towers shone in the sun.

What made him pause was some movement on the road that led up from the bay into the city. From this distance he could not see for certain, but it appeared to be a small group of the elves heading into the city, and it looked like they were carrying something. In fact, it almost looked as if they were carrying a person, which struck Bilbo as odd. It was hard to imagine anyone here on the Isle being sick or injured enough to need to be carried. It must surely be something else, he thought; but all the same, he wandered back toward home in a roundabout way, toward the bay and the city, in case there was anything else to see.

As it happened, there was, for just as he turned down the hill toward home, he glanced back one more time toward the road below, and saw, this time, a single figure coming up from the city and leaving the road to climb the hill in his direction. Curious, Bilbo waited, and became more curious still when he recognized the figure.

"Gandalf! Whatever is happening?" he wondered aloud, and walked down to meet the wizard.

"Ah, Bilbo. I'm glad I found you here. Frodo is not with you, is he?"

"No, he's not. It's very difficult to pry him out of the study these days, as a matter of fact. Is something the matter? You look, well, flustered, as I haven't seen you in a long time. There can't be trouble with the elves, can there?"

"No, not trouble," Gandalf said, "although something is amiss, it seems." He continued up the hill, to Bilbo's surprise. "We'll find Frodo at home, then? Good. You are both wanted in the city."

"Really! Whatever for?"

Gandalf didn't answer but moved along quickly, and Bilbo trotted along as quickly as his old feet would carry him to keep up.

Bilbo had not grown younger on the Elvish isle, but a great deal of his health and vigor had returned, though he was still very fond of his daily naps. His mind was alert again, and his appetite for food and drink had returned to nearly their old healthy hobbit levels. He often felt, especially on his walks, like his old self, in the days before his great adventure - just a simple hobbit with no great ambitions, few needs, and no desire for anything more than what life had given him. Plain good food, Elvish song and story, a cozy home, and a nice bit of garden outside his windows were all his delights. There was only one thing that still troubles his heart, and but for that, he would be utterly content.

"Frodo does not come out to walk with you anymore, I take it?" Gandalf said, pausing at the crest of the hill for Bilbo to catch up.

"Hardly ever. He's hard at work on that poem, you know. The translation, that is. Luthien's tale. It was your idea, you and Gildor, to keep our language alive, and he's taken to it with all his heart and mind - it seems to be all he'll think about."

They walked more slowly down the slope, the sound of the sea muffled by the hill behind them. From this side the gardens and windows of the smial could be seen, a splash of color among the grey-green seacoast hills.

"It's a dark tale, for all its beauty," Gandalf said thoughtfully.

"Yes, well. Might not have been the best choice, I suppose. But then... " Bilbo hesitated, and Gandalf turned and looked at him quickly, questioning. "Well, I'm no longer certain it was the best choice for him to come here," Bilbo finally admitted.

"Is that so?" Gandalf paused, looking down at Bilbo intently. Bilbo noted that he did not seem very surprised.

"A hobbit belongs in The Shire-- except for me, I'm more at home with Elves now. But I often wonder if Frodo wouldn't have found healing there, as he hasn't yet found it here. It's where our roots are, or maybe better to say, our hearts, after all."

"So you think he should have stayed behind? It was his own choice to come with you, you know."

Bilbo sighed. "Perhaps I should have stayed as well. Maybe then I could have helped him more."

"You had your own healing to do," Gandalf reminded him gently. "And you would have been parted from him soon, in that case, I'm afraid."

The hobbit sighed again. "I suppose you're right. I had barely enough strength left for the journey here, as it was. The time of our parting will come soon enough, as it is. I'm only afraid..."

"What are you afraid of Bilbo?" Gandalf said, looking at him sharply, though his voice was mild.

Bilbo gazed down at the bright little garden, and at the dark window of the study that could be seen behind a row of sunflowers.

"If you must know, I'm afraid I shall be the one left behind," Bilbo said, almost as if to himself. He glanced at Gandalf, and away quickly.

"You've done all you can for him, Bilbo," Gandalf said, bending to lay his hand on the hobbit's shoulder. "It is not your task to make everything come out right, you known."

Bilbo nodded, blinking and trying to smile. Gandalf straightened and turned toward the hobbit hole again, looking down at it rather sternly, Bilbo thought.

"Help may come in unlooked for ways," the wizard said as he started walking.

"Whatever does that mean?" Bilbo asked.

"Perhaps nothing."

Bilbo realized he was going to get no more answers at least for the moment. With his curiosity breaking through his concern for Frodo, he hurried along at the wizard's side.

Frodo had no great desire to leave his study, even though he hadn't written a word in some time. He preferred to let his mind wander in the beautiful, tragic tale of Beren and Luthien, more comfortable there than in his own dark memories. He was surprised when Gandalf and Bilbo called to him from the window, surprised enough to be coaxed out in to the sunlight. Frodo sighed as he left his desk, but he found a smile of greeting for the wizard, even though he'd almost started to dread meeting that piercing gaze. He thought he could hide the darkness in his heart from Bilbo, but he knew Gandalf could see through his smile with ease.

The flowers in Bilbo's garden and the sea-fresh air did nothing to pierce the shadows in Frodo's mind. But as soon as they started walking, his attention was caught by Gandalf's unexpected news of a new arrival on the Elvish isle. He exchanged an astonished glance with Bilbo.

"A new arrival from the Havens?" Bilbo asked, and Frodo lifted his eyes at last to look up anxiously into the wizard's face. His pulse quickened in sudden hope.

"No, I don't believe it is from the Havens," Gandalf said, with a quick glance at Frodo. "It is not yet time for the last ships to sail from Middle Earth, as time is reckoned in the outer world," he said gravely. Frodo dropped his eyes to the ground again.

"Then, what concern is it of ours?" he asked, his voice dull with disappointment.

"That you shall see for yourselves. For now I will tell you only this, that the boat ran aground on the south shore, with a broken mast and no oars."

"But was there anyone aboard the boat?" Bilbo asked impatiently.

"There was a Man aboard her," Gandalf said.

"A man!" Bilbo exclaimed, and the hobbits looked at each other again in surprise.

"Yes. A youth, I'd say of less than 20 years."

"You've seen him?" Frodo asked, intrigued in spite of himself.

"Briefly. He is sick or injured, though we could find no wound on him. He did not awaken when I spoke to him, but Gildor, who found him, says he spoke a few words in a strange language before he fainted."

"A language unknown to the Elves?" Bilbo wondered at that.

Bilbo asked more questions, but Gandalf had no more to say as they walked along. Curiosity now spurred them on. Even Frodo found himself looking forward to reaching the city and catching a glimpse of this mystery.

"But why summon us?" he asked as they passed through the gates. "Hobbits know even less of Men than the Elves do."

"The answer to that you shall know in a moment," Gandalf said, and that was all they could get out of him.

When they entered the room where the injured young Man rested in bed, the elves withdrew, leaving the hobbits and Gandalf alone with him. The wizard gestured them forward, and they approached cautiously. Bilbo peered over the edge of the bed, and gave a small gasp.

"Goodness!" he exclaimed, turning to his nephew with his eyes wide with questions.

Beside him, Frodo said nothing, but stared in astonishment at the young Man. The boy's face was his own -- or nearly so. It was young, far younger than he felt, but they were his own features, although they were peacefully composed in deep sleep. If that face woke up and smiled, he thought, it would look as he had long ago, before Bilbo left him in the Shire, before... everything. Yet, as he looked longer, he could see that the face was not entirely untroubled, even softened by sleep. There were blue shadows under the closed eyes, and a line between the brows that revealed some deep worry or lingering pain, a line far too deeply etched for one who appeared so young.

The boy's hands rested on top of the sheet that was over him. Even they were like Frodo's own hands, as he couldn't help but notice-- except, of course, that they were whole. The nails were bitten to the quick, and as he watched, the fingers twitched a little. Frodo felt fascinated by those hands, even more so than by the face, but gazing at them he felt a chill, almost of fear.

"Who is he?" Frodo asked, his voice a whisper. He tore his gaze away from the hands to look up into Gandalf's face.

The old wizard studied the figure on the bed with curiosity, and, Frodo thought, with some sadness.

"I do not know. How he came to be here, or from where he came, I cannot guess. Our first concern is to nurse him back to health, from whatever has weakened him so - whether it was the journey itself or the thing that sent him on it, we don't know. And then, when he is stronger, we must find a way to speak to him."

In some kind of dream, Casey kept looking into a watery mirror. He couldn't see his own face, just a shadowy shape with light dancing around its edges. He heard a sound, a murmur like distant waves, but with words in it, or maybe music. He would just start to understand and then it would fade again. Someone kept moving a light around; he could sense it even though his eyes were closed.

He knew he ought to open his eyes and see what was going on, but he didn't want to, not yet. It couldn't be time for school yet. Just a little more sleep. He was just comfortable enough to know that he didn't want to wake up yet. It was like the best of Saturday mornings, almost waking up and realizing you didn't have to after all, and going back to sleep. But the light kept dancing around that shadow in the mirror, and eventually he felt curious enough to want to see what that was about. So he opened his eyes.

The first thing he noticed when his eyes were opened was, oddly enough, a smell - an aromatic, herby smell, like a rich woodsy incense, with a hint of a spice like clove.

"Who's smoking?" he wondered aloud, before his brain was connected enough to think of a more logical question like "where am I?" or "what happened?"

Logic went out the window a moment later, anyway. Someone leaned over him, an old man with sparkling eyes under bushy eyebrows, and a long white beard, who happened to be smoking a pipe.

"Ah. You can speak," said a rich, warm voice, sounding very pleased with either him or itself.

"Apparently," Casey said, proving the point. He could move a little, too, which seemed to be something of a surprise. It felt like he hadn't moved much in a long time. He wiggled fingers and toes, slowly working up to stretching. It actually felt good to stretch a little, as if the movement could squeeze old pain out of his limbs. All the while he gazed up at the old, bearded face above him.

"Who are you?" he asked at last.

"Hmmm," the old man seemed to consider this a surprisingly challenging question. "Perhaps you should call me Gandalf."

"Gandalf," Casey repeated, catching the deep, rolling sound of it but at the same time hearing it said rather differently in his mind. "Oh-kaay..." he said, suddenly amused but at the same time suddenly cautious. "You can be Gandalf. You look the part, any way," he added as an afterthought.

One bushy eyebrow shot upward at this remark.

"You know this name?" the old man asked, eyeing him in wonder.

"Um, yeah," Casey said, feeling even more cautious. It wasn't a good idea to offend an insane person, he thought. "You're the famous wizard, right?"

The old man stopped short in mid-puff on his pipe and stared hard at Casey, who stared back as innocently as he could manage, trying to smile in a non-offending way.

"Where have you come from?" the old man asked at last, and the way he said it gave Casey the feeling that everything in the universe could hinge on the answer.

"Maybe before I answer that you should tell me where I am," he said cautiously.

Gandalf, as he called himself, considered this for a moment before answering. "You are in the city of Avallone, on the Isle of Eressea on the Shores of Aman."

Casey lay back with a suppressed sigh. "Harrington Hospital Psych Ward," he muttered, closing his eyes. "I've lost it." He fought an urge to giggle, although he wasn't sure what he thought was funny about it. Giggling just seemed to go with being insane.

Gandalf again pondered Casey's words for a moment before speaking.

"You are not mad, as I discern your words to mean you think you are. I speak the truth. Look around you."

Casey opened his eyes again, cautiously, and looked around. The walls of the room were of white stone like marble, and rich, dark beams of wood crossed the ceiling. Narrow windows set in the wall let in soft golden light. The old man, or wizard, whatever he was, sat in a high backed carved wooden chair beside the bed, and next to him was another, smaller chair and a low stool. The bed itself was firm and soft, with a headboard of dark wood carved with trees and vines interlaced with stars.

On the opposite side of the bed, away from the old man's chair, there was a small table, which held a pitcher and cup and bowl on a silver tray. It hardly looked like hospital issue, Casey noted. Nothing did, for that matter. And it didn't smell like a hospital at all, or sound like one - no soft nurses' voices muttering from the hallway, no bells or phones ringing, no hum of machinery.

In fact, what suddenly struck him was the depth of the silence, but then he noticed it was not really silence after all -- quiet, but not silence. He heard a whisper of wind in leaves and birds singing outside the open windows. All he could see through the windows from where he lay was a patch of incredibly blue sky. And the smells - the old man's pipe, and something fresh and clean beyond that, rather like mint or lemon; and then, wafted in on the breeze, the scent of the sea.

That brought him sitting up in bed, as he suddenly remembered his last waking thoughts: the boat, the waves, and the strange men who came and spoke over him before he passed out.

"What's going on?" Casey asked, turning to the old man, who was watching him with knowing eyes. He suddenly knew, although part of his mind still denied it, that this was real. Wherever here was, he was really here.

(to be continued)


End file.
